Nairobi, August 12, 2014--The Committee to Protect Journalists calls for the release of Mohamed Ibrahim Waiss, a radio journalist who was taken into custody on Friday in a suburb of the capital, Djibouti City, and accused of incitement and publishing false news.

Police arrested Mohamed, a journalist for the opposition online radio station La Voix de Djibouti (The Voice of Djibouti) at 1 p.m. while he was covering a demonstration by the Union Pour Le Salut National (Union for National Salvation), a coalition of opposition parties, according to local journalists and news reports. The union routinely holds weekly protests to protest a lack of basic services and democracy, local journalists told CPJ.

Police arrested
Mohamed Ibrahim, a journalist for the pro-opposition news website and radio
station, La Voix de Djibouti
(The Voice of Djibouti), on December 12, 2013, while he was covering a protest
in the Balbala suburb of the capital, Djibouti City, according to local
journalists.

The demonstration was staged by women demanding land plots that
had been promised by the government after authorities demolished residences in
their neighborhood, the journalists said.

Online journalist Houssein
Ahmed Farah spent more than three months in jail in Djibouti before an
appeals court finally released him in November--after his defense requested
bail three times, Houssein said. His crime? Officially nothing. "It appears to
have been an arbitrary arrest because there is still no evidence on file," Houssein
told me. He said he was accused of distributing identity cards for the
opposition, but he has not been charged with a crime.

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Nairobi, August 15,
2012--Authorities in Djibouti must immediately release a journalist for an
opposition news website who has been jailed for a week without charge or access
to a lawyer or his family, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.

Two police officers
arrested Houssein Ahmed Farah, a contributor to the Europe-based news website La
Voix de Djibouti(The Voice of Djibouti), on August 8, according to
news reports.
Three days later, a local judge ordered him to be remanded to Gabode Prison in
Djibouti City, the capital, according to local journalists. Houssein is
diabetic, and local journalists believe he has not been granted access to a
doctor while in detention.

As news of Middle Eastern and North African protests swirl around the globe, satellite television and the Internet prove vital sources of information for Africans as governments fearful of an informed citizenry and a free press such as in Eritrea, Equatorial Guinea, and Zimbabwe impose total news blackouts on the developments.

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Your Excellency:
The Committee to Protect Journalists is deeply troubled that Radio France Internationale's (RFI) FM broadcasts in Djibouti have been cut since January 14.
According to RFI and French media reports, Djiboutian authorities silenced the broadcaster because of its report on an ongoing French legal inquiry into the 1995 death in Djibouti of Bernard Borrel, a French judge. RFI reported on January 12 that a French court had summoned the head of the Djiboutian secret services, Hassan Saïd, as a witness in the inquiry. An earlier French inquiry conducted in Djibouti had concluded that Borrel committed suicide.

According to RFI and French media reports, Djiboutian authorities silenced the broadcaster because of its report on an ongoing French legal inquiry into the 1995 death in Djibouti of Bernard Borrel, a French judge. RFI reported on January 12 that a French court had summoned the head of the Djiboutian secret services, Hassan Saïd, as a witness in the inquiry. An earlier French inquiry conducted in Djibouti had concluded that Borrel committed suicide.

Police detained Farah, editor of the opposition weekly Le Renouveau, at his home in Djibouti. He was taken to the Public Prosecutor's Office, charged with defamation and distributing false news, and then released.

AS SPORADIC GUN BATTLES CONTINUED BETWEEN GOVERNMENT FORCES AND REBELS of the United Revolutionary Front (FRUD), state broadcast and print outlets tailored their coverage to the propaganda needs of President Ismael Omar Guelleh's government. The opposition press, led by the weekly papers La Republique, Le Temps, and Le Renouveau, was little more objective.

The civil strife is rooted in tensions between the majority Issa ethnic group, which dominates the government, and the minority Afar group, which dominates the FRUD. The government refuses to release casualty figures and continues to downplay the gravity of the rebellion. Journalists working for state media practice self-censorship in order to avoid accusations of supporting the rebels, and authorities are quick to retaliate against independent and opposition media that try to cover the conflict.